The Person of Christ

We recite the apostles Creed. We declare that we believe in Jesus Christ, God's only son, our Lord, there is a sense in which this title Christ is pregnant with meaning that draws its meaning from the various pages and chapters of Old Testament biblical history and all that is fulfilled in Jesus.

For centuries Christians excluded the churches and recited the familiar words of this great confession of faith.

The earliest version of the apostles Creed dates back to the middle of the second century.

The version we used today came with you sometime in the middle of the fifth century. It affirms belief in God as father son and Holy Spirit this week on Renewing Your Mind, Dr. RC Sproul is using the apostles Creed to explain the fundamental doctrines of Christianity doing RC now going to start now with that section of the cream that moves our attention from God the father to God the son, and though the creed is brief. The biggest section of the creed focuses of course on the person and the work of Jesus swats called Christianity because at the heart of our faith is the person and work of Jesus. And so the creed reads after the statements of maker of heaven and earth with respect to God and in Jesus Christ his only son our Lord.

Just look at that segment of the great Jesus Christ his only son our Lord now a lot is being said in those words not we have a separate series currently in air that goes into detail of the meaning of the titles that are ascribed to Jesus in the New Testament, but I will just mention in passing a couple of the significant aspects about this part of the confession that when the church says that they believe in Jesus Christ. The word Christ is not understood here simply as a person's name but in the New Testament we find numerous titles given to Jesus and in terms of the frequencies of titles that are ascribed to Jesus far and away the most frequent number one. The numerical occurrence is the title Christ, we have to keep in mind that Jesus is his name and Christ is his supreme title if you were to ask in antiquity. What Jesus full name was, you would hear something like Jesus bar Joseph or Jesus of Nazareth.

His name is not Jesus Christ. But this title is so important, so preeminent to the New Testament teaching about Jesus that we often think of the title Christ as if it were the last name of Jesus, but we must remember that when the church made that confession. They were reiterating the confession that Saint Peter made at Caesarea Philippi thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. The word Christ in the New Testament, simply write directly from the Greek word Christoph's, which translates the Old Testament word messy, which comes over in English is what work Messiah the meaning of the term Messiah the meaning of the term Christos or Christ is the anointed one, but when we say that we believe in Jesus Christ. We are making a confession of faith.

At that point, saying Jesus is the long awaited Messiah and the title Christ is a loaded title because in the Old Testament, we don't have one unitary simple portrait of what the Messiah was promised Israel will look like, but rather we have different strands of messianic expectancy in the Old Testament there are those prophecies of the Messiah who will come who will be like Moses, the mediator of the new covenant, and so you have that strand of the portrait of the Messiah. One outcome.

Like most or you here in Isaiah's prophecies of the prediction of the one who is the suffering servant of Israel, the servant of the Lord, the one who will bear the sins of the people who will enter into humiliation so you have all of those prophecies about this Messiah character will be a suffering servant, and then you have the messianic promises of the Old Testament, the talk about the restoration of the kingdom of Israel to the days of glory, like it was under David and out of the seed of David out of that lineage of David and out of the tribe of Judah, the king will come to usher in the new dimension of the reign of God. So you have the whole concept of the Davidic king that the people look forward to and we can go on how, but in the apocalyptic literature in the Old Testament, particularly in the book of Daniel, which talks about a heavenly being who is sent to earth from the throne of the ancient days whose function is to be the judge of the world in his title is called the son of me as I have all these different viewpoints or perspectives or nuances to the portrait of the Messiah. And if you were just really Old Testament and looked at all those different strands. The second Adam is a good one. Like Moses, the Son of Man, the suffering servant, the Davidic king. All these different strands that you're looking for. How could all of those conference in one person's incredible. It's unthinkable that you could have one brand of the seed of David a human being who is a king, and yet at the same time a judge that sent from heaven try to put those two together and if that's not complicated enough. Add to that the idea of a suffering servant. How does that suffering servant square with the portrait of a royal can remote as a lawgiver, yet what we find in the New Testament is that every one of these individual strands converge in the symmetry of the life and the work of Jesus Christ's incredible, particularly if you study the details of those different expectancies and see how they all come to pass against the high priest add that motif makes it all the more complicated and yet Jesus comes and he exercises the role of the prophet he exercises the role of the king. He exercises the role of the great high priest, prophet, priest and king.

Not only that he is the sin bearer. He's the suffering servant. Remember John's vision in the book of Revelation when he is allowed to peer into the judgment seat of heaven and the scroll was there in the book of life is there and the announcement comes who is worthy to open the book and nobody is worthy and then finally the angel announces that behold the lion from the tribe of Judah has prevailed that he will come in and open up the book and you're all waiting there for the lion, the come roaring out of the center stage in the rip open the scroll seals in and reveal the contents of this book and what happens there's a lion come a lamp that was slain. Steps on the center state so there is a sense in which this title Christ is pregnant with meaning that draws its meaning from the various pages and chapters of Old Testament biblical history and all that is fulfilled in Jesus.

So the church confesses it's faith that Jesus is the anointed one, the one promised beforehand to Israel, the Messiah of the people of God and in Jesus Christ his only son here that Craig calls attention to the uniqueness of Christ Jesus is called the only begotten of the father in the Bible that the son ship that he enjoys the relationship that he has with the father is one-of-a-kind.

In fact, I'm searching in the English language for a word that will capture the concept that we find in the Scriptures. The New Testament we use the term unique. We use the term only, but they don't really cover the waterfront adequately.

The Germans have a word for it. I knew Marla kite once for all costs that Jesus is what the Bible calls the Monaghan Ace, the only begotten son of the father is what we call silly gainers that is in a class by himself. There is none like him. There is no one who has repeated that we are called sons of God only by virtue of our adoption in Jesus Christ.

So Jesus is uniquely the son of God. That's one of his titles but more often the New Testament refers to Jesus as Son of Man.

I forget the exact number 82 or 83 times in the New Testament Jesus called the Son of Man in all but two or three of those. Jesus does. This is Jesus favorite title for himself. Son of Man. So, since the church confesses both the humanity of Jesus and the deity of Jesus and we have two title son of God, Son of Man, it would be natural to assume that the title Son of Man has primary reference to what humanity and son of God, primary reference to his deity. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way okay because, in fact, the figure of the Son of Man in the Old Testament is a heavenly being, and the Son of Man does not refer to Jesus deity exclusively. There is an element in the title Son of Man that calls attention to his humanity, but eminently the emphasis in the title Son of Man is on his heavenly nature. So there's a sense in which they are almost reversed, but not quite. We would be equally an error if we said that just the opposite. Son of Man emphasizes deity, but contains humanity son of God actually emphasizes humanity because again son ship is defined by obedience and angels are sometimes called sons of God. Things are called sons of God, so that the title son of God, in and of itself does not necessarily imply deity. However, when we look at the title. Only begotten son. When the New Testament works over that theme of the Monaghan Ace, the only begotten of the father.

I think it does incorporate more than that relationship of filial obedience and calls attention to the divine character of Christ.

Okay, we have the title Christ we have the title only son, and we have the title our Lord. Remember I said at the beginning that the very first confession of faith of the early church was the simple statement you Jesus Ho curios Jesus is Lord. The word for Lord in the New Testament, the Greek word that is applied to Jesus here is the Greek translation of the Hebrew title Adam, which in the Old Testament is virtually exclusively relegated to God the father. Remember the Jews didn't like to speak the name of Yahweh was the ineffable name the unspoken night and so the Jews sought means of what we call circumlocution what circumlocution walking around something or talking around something that's circumlocution is the Latin way of saying it. I guess, and para Francis is another word means the same things come from different language. The idea of walking or talking around something without actually saying and so in Jewish worship in order to avoid desecrating or blaspheming the sacred name the name that they most frequently used for God, was the title Adam the Hebrew equivalent to the New Testament, Lord, Lord, and so the concept of the Lordship of Jesus had a majestic Imperial meaning to it. The Lord is one who is sovereign and sovereignty in the absolute sense, to the Jew is reserved for God. One of the reasons why the Christians became human torches to illumine the gardens of Nero and so on is because as part of their loyalty oath to the Roman empire they had to make this simple affirmation Kaiser hello curios Caesar is Lord and a Christian say will pay our taxes will obey, the magistrates will do everything you tell us to do will say that Caesar is Caesar wanting we will not do is take the title Lord and render it to cease. We will render to Caesar the things that are Caesar, but unto God the things that are God and the title curios in the supreme sense Lord is to be applied only to God and so when the Christian church confessed that Jesus was Lord, and not just Lord, not just curios but curios curio the Lord of lords. It was clearly an ascription of deity to Jesus. Remember there cannot a Kim of Philippians 2 pulses have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God took his equality with God, not as a thing to be grasped, were tenaciously held onto jealously guarded that he emptied himself none of his deity, certainly, but he emptied himself and took upon himself the form of a servant became obedient, even unto death, and so on. Wherefore hath God highly exalted him and given him the name that is above every name, that the name of Jesus every knee should bow and every tongue confess what that he is Lord that he is curios to the glory of God the father and the question is what is the name that is above every on the surface it may appear in the text of the name of Paul is saying is above every name is the name Jesus. Jesus had that name before he perfected his work of obedience. That's the name he has from his childhood. It's only in his ascension really and his exultation that he is given the supremely the name that is above every board is that Lord and that's the name we are called upon to express on our knees and on our faces before Jesus, so that when we say that Jesus is our Lord, we say he is our sovereign. He has authority over us is not only our Savior but he is our sovereign okay now after this brief confession of titles with respect to Jesus in very rapidfire synopsis, the creed goes over the skeletal outline of the life of Jesus. Now in theology we distinguish between the first of Christ and the work of Christ, the notice I said we distinguish them, but you can ever separate them because there's a sense in which how do we know the person of Jesus by what he did and how we know the significance of what he did.

By understanding who he was, so that the two have a relationship of reciprocity and mutual connection between person and work.

Notice that in the beginning of the creed we have a confession about the person of Jesus's identity. Who is is the Christ is the only son of God, he is our Lord now what about the work of Christ, which now calls attention to what he did as Messiah son and Lord and what he did is incorporated in his life and it's interesting to me at least, that the creed begins with an affirmation of his virgin birth in the Roman symbol that we've mentioned before, it simply said he was born by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary was any mention of conception. But that detail is added later. But from the earliest days in church history. The affirmation of the virgin birth of Jesus was central to the churches confession I was just reading again in GC Burke hours work the other day called the work of Christ. He said that from the first century through the 19th century.

It's been virtually a monolithic, nonnegotiable article of confession of the Christian faith and even in the second century the church fathers the second century considered the virgin birth as an essential item of Christianity that is if you didn't believe in the virgin birth. You could not gain admission into the Christian church and Burkart said that it is interesting that it is only in that period of church history where the integrity and trustworthiness of the Scripture has been under attack that the churches ever had to defend within its own membership.

It's ancient confession of the virgin birth of Jesus. And as I go over in the book basic training. I try to go over briefly, at least some of the major issues that have emerged in the last hundred and 50 years that center on this question of the virgin birth, but I want to look at something here for just a moment that maybe you haven't thought and that's why did the theologians of church history regarding the virgin birth as being important, not merely because the integrity of the apostolic witnesses at stake. You know Luke's trustworthiness in recording it in Matthew, trustworthiness, and teaching it. But is there any theological significance to the virgin birth.

As soon as you asked that question.

You do embark upon something of a highway of speculation which can become a little bit dangerous but some say was it necessary for Jesus to be born of a virgin in order to accomplish the work that God sent him to carrier. While some argue I'm sure you've heard this argument that it was very important that Jesus not be born tainted by Original Sin, and it was axiomatic in the Scripture that everyone that is born to the natural progression of birth brought into the world with the fallen human nature that which is born of the flesh is flesh is in the state of fallenness. The Redeemer is like us in every respect but one he is sinless and it doesn't just mean actual sin but is also without Original Sin, so some just simply see the explanation, the rational explanation for the virgin birth as being focused strictly in the whole question of Jesus being born with or without Original Sin other similar nuances to that they could get us into some parentheses that may last forever, but the other dimension that is often overlooked is that in the churches understanding of the Trinity and in the churches understanding of the person of Christ. The church is declared that in the Trinity.

We have one essence three persons and that's the classic and traditional formula for the Trinity that God is one in essence three in person. But how is the church confessed her faith in the mystery of the incarnation in the person of Jesus is just the opposite. In Jesus, you have only persons one person to nature's but understand that theologically, how can you have one person and two natures. It's not that God stops being God and starts being a man or a man is suddenly deified, but the idea is that the second person of the Trinity, the eternal son of God doesn't lose something of his own nature, but he takes upon himself a human nature so that the second person of the Trinity adds to himself a human nature not a human person. Otherwise you have to persons you got one person with a divine nature and human nature. The second person of the Trinity, the divine Logos assumes a human nature and he gets that human nature from the it gets the flesh or the humanity from Mary the divine person. However comes and requires that and is born into this world so that you have one person who natures and again is speculative but the speculation is that is what God did to avoid having to persons or a mutation of the divine nature were a deification of a human.

That's not Jersey's role, exploring the rich meetings of the titles of Jesus. Thanks for listening to Renewing Your Mind on this Tuesday, kindly web this week. Dr. Spruill is using the apostles Creed as a framework for explaining the basics of the Christian faith for your donation of any amount we would like to send you the DVD that contains all six lessons you can make your request online at Renewing Your Mind on work or you can call us.

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